How Many Boards Should I Have On My Forum?

[Mr. Magic]

On my Magical Norm forums, I'm trying to keep my main page to a minnimum for my members. It helps in load times, I believe, for my members. It also just looks neater. I have a total of 3 categories for my forums: General, Magic and a gaming section. I also have a 4th area for my staff which is a hidden category. I did have another category that strictly had my rules, FAQs, contests and announcements, but decided to make it a subject in my General forums and keep the subjects in it as sub-boards and it looks good I believe.

As for my subjects for the categories, I try to keep them to a minnimum as well. I have even combined some subjects together since they go together so well, and guess what? it looks good!

I have to agree on the advice of starting off small. The bestt hing to do is to make the forums your member's own forums. Let tthem run the forums somewhat by giving some ideas. the ProBoards forums is good like that, you can alweays change things around and enhance it to the way that your members will enjoy it.

[ungoliant]

well, it all really depends on your site and your members...my site has 17 boards in total, all being used,
though I do have a level system (since recently) so people will have to have a certain postcount before they can see more than the 2 general catagories. the higher your level, the more boards you see.
I've got 8 catagories, in my opinion you should have at least 3 boards per catagory, or it'll look messy.

[Celtic Guy]

My board has 5 boards and 13 threads, with one sub-board. I only have 6 users, so I think it is pretty well balanced. I have to advertise some though so I can get more users. Maybe I should concentrate on one topic, not have threads and stuff for the different subjects.

[Des]

My site started with about 35 boards on the front page, now we have about 40. (Over the course of 4 and 1/2 Months). We also have a few sub-boards, but not so many. However, we have done fairly well. While some of the boards don't have too much activity, most boards do. Often, when making a new board, I let members decide which board they want and let them suggest boards to make. It is a good system as the members always know which boards they will go to.

But really, even the same boards don't succeed on relatively similar sites! Recently, I saw a forum the same size as ours, with almost the same amount of members, and a simliar concept (magical roleplay), and "The Library" there was one of the most active boards, while with our site it is the least used board. Weird? We even share some members with that site. I must figure out why it is like that.

My advice to new admins, make the number of boards small. Especially if doing a hogwarts roleplay, don't put in each and every thing, for gods sake. It messes up things king-size. Just start with minimum boards, and let the members decide the rest. (I mean, if you have 1st Floor Corridor, 2nd floor Corridor, 3rd Floor Corridor, 4th Floor Corridor...till 7th Floor, will it be active at all?)

[Gamersbox]

can some one join my forum i need members pm me plz

[☼DaMetFan☼]

i like forums with 15-20 boards
any less it seems to cramped
any more its like each board has like 5 threads it scares me
most forums i've seen no matter how many boards they have concentrate their posting in about 4 different boards the rest are considered minor

[Enchant]

sprout960 said:

can some one join my forum i need members pm me plz

Please do not spam these boards. I assure you this will not encourage members to join, if anything it will deter them.Thank you

[animeanimal]

_{Depends. Start out with very few boards. As your forums grows and increases in member count, so should your boards. There should be many places for members to chat, talk abuot family, pets, etc. When you have a bit of inactiveness, you could size down to sub-boards, until your activess spurs up at an increasingly good rate. Once you get about.... roughly.. 50 or so members, you can open up many more places for members to have fun, and do more activities to keep them from getting bored. So, my advice is just start small, then at the right time, expand.}

[¤Pablo¤]

well I say what the hey its your forum and no one can tell you that you have to many or not enough boards but then again it your choice

[WilburyMania!]

On my forum, I started with a moderate amount of boards. I will add or combine some, depending on the posts.

[Lainey]

When I started my last project before I did my Interactive Forums project. I noticed that alot of my members were confussed because it was using mostly sub-boards.

That Forum: amethystlainey.proboards61.com/
New Forum: interactforums.proboards88.com/index.cgi?

I just cant figure out what was wrong with the top link but I decided to start over and make it or I hope I made it better to follow and easier to post on and bring in members.

[Madison Marie Gregory]

i have 40 boards, 4 sub boards and 8 catagorys is that two many for site that has only been open for RPing for about 2 weeks??

[Candice]

May 27, 2008 7:33:13 GMT -8 Madison Marie Gregory said:

i have 40 boards, 4 sub boards and 8 catagorys is that two many for site that has only been open for RPing for about 2 weeks??

It fully depends on your members and their activity level. If they or you can't fill those in then you have too many.

[HoudiniDerek]

May 27, 2008 7:33:13 GMT -8 Madison Marie Gregory said:

i have 40 boards, 4 sub boards and 8 catagorys is that two many for site that has only been open for RPing for about 2 weeks??

While I agree overall with Candy about your members and their ability to fill them up, I have a question for you:

Are they all absolutely necessary? Most times it seems that, especially on RPs, that people put as many places as possible to try and cover every possibility. Most times some of those boards stay empty because no one wants an RP place like that. I would make sure that each board is absolutely necessary and does not double with something else you already have.

[jhar26]

I think it's more important to have active boards than to have a high number of 'em that nobody ever visits or posts on. Narrow it down as much as possible is the way to go IMO.